Introduction
In mid July 2011 civic activists organised nationwide demonstrations to pressure President Bingu wa Mutharika's government to address deepening economic and governance problems. Government, using district commissioners, the courts, and the national police tried to stop them, but they went ahead. Over two days the marches deteriorated into riots and looting that resulting in the death of 20 at the hands of police. During the following two months some civil-society leaders tried to organise other demonstrations but these were cancelled when the police warned them that they would be held financially responsible for any damages and that the security services had no way of handling crowds without using live ammunition. Meanwhile the United Nations (UN) spearheaded negotiations between a faction of civil society's leadership and government representatives, negotiations that focused on the 20 demands sent to the president on 20 July. After that, tensions and economic difficulties continued, culminating in sporadic public unrest, and activists' threats to halt the unproductive negotiations and to take to the streets again in March 2012. Instead, dialogue continued until the unexpected happened: President Mutharika suffered a fatal heart attack on 5 April and Joyce Banda ascended to office after two days of intrigue.
This briefing outlines the underlying causes of the mid July demonstrations and general discontent, and of government's response to public anger and to the strengthening political opposition. It explores the trends and logic rooted in Malawi's history and policy environment that are driving events. All of these must be seen within the context of national elections in mid 2014, for which political jockeying within and between the parties has already begun.
Malawi 2009–11
To maintain stability and economic growth a country needs a political settlement that sees the national elite buying into and benefiting from the way the country's political power is obtained and used and from its economic strategy (Khan 2010). After surviving a first term marked by political turmoil, in mid 2009 a political settlement was reached when Mutharika and his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) won a landslide victory on the back of his government having delivered development since 2004.1 The fact that the opposition offered no credible alternative – in terms of policies or leadership – ensured a huge DPP majority in parliament2 in Mutharika's second term (Ott and Kanyongolo 2010).
In his second term Mutharika appointed a new minister of finance who was less experienced and independent than his successful first-term minister. He and Mutharika took control of the economy with the intention of keeping the kwacha exchange rate stable against the US dollar. This meant that by 2010 it was overvalued in real terms by 10–20% and a parallel market in foreign exchange (forex) had appeared. After the appointment of yet another new minister and a minor devaluation in late 2011, the parallel market remained vibrant and the disparity grew to 80% by early 2012 even as the IMF, which had turned off its extended credit facility (ECF), begged the government to devalue by 40% (Weekend Nation 2012a).3 Meanwhile the government resorted to domestic and external borrowing to pay its bills (The Nation 2011a and 2012a) and foreign investment fell for the third year in a row (The Nation 2012b).
The result from 2009 onwards was a contraction of business, external payment arrears that saw the closing-off of lines of credit, and fewer and more expensive intermediate inputs that increased the cost of, and depressed, local production. By mid 2011 businesses no longer bothered to approach banks, which had no forex to sell. The lack of forex and credit impacted petrol dealers worst of all, and fuel shortages rebounded throughout the economy as minibuses increased fares and/or stopped running, transport costs rose, factories closed and dismissed staff, and the availability of consumer goods declined as prices climbed. Inflation reached 9.8% at the end of the year (The Nation 2012c) when motorists were waiting days in petrol queues and electricity outages reached six hours per day. New construction projects were halted mid stream.
Macro-level statistics told a sorry tale. Economic growth that had reached near 9% in 2008 levelled off in 2010 and slowed further in 2011. By the end of the year the Economist Intelligent Unit was predicting it to fall to 4.3% per annum (Weekend Nation 2012b). Balance of payments worsened even as mining revenues came on stream. Revenues from tobacco (accounting historically for about 60% of export revenues) fell from 2008 and collapsed completely in 2011. Mutharika reacted by setting minimum prices and bullying buyers, accusing companies of transfer pricing and externalising profits, and deporting tobacco bosses (‘exploitative colonialists’) when companies said they had a backlog of tobacco in store and refused to meet his demands. Falling tobacco sales worsened Malawi's forex position even more, and the high foreign-exchange rate reduced real local currency export prices, which hindered macroeconomic performance further. Tobacco farmers suffered, and maize farmers, who had benefited from subsidies that generated surpluses, found themselves hurt by falling prices in mid 2011. Maize prices began to rise again at the end of the year, but by then more than a third of Malawi's districts were at risk of experiencing shortages (Business Day 2012).
Though all classes suffered, particularly important here is the middle class. It had grown slowly from Hastings Kamuzu Banda's civil servants-cum-estate holders and Bakili Muluzi's new businessmen and women to form Mutharika's burgeoning, car-importing, house-building, luxuries-shopping urbanites. Add to that the farmers who, with the help of subsidies, had managed to rise above smallholder status by growing and exporting crops such as tobacco and cotton. At the same time a new youthful, relatively well-educated and Internet-connected group had arisen, with modern aspirations and urban lifestyles. Servicing the needs of this broader elite proved impossible for Mutharika though. As Malawian industrialists have been saying for more than a decade, the country is short of the infrastructure needed to generate and deliver water, electricity, cheap transport and communications.4 Muluzi's ‘lost decade’ and chaotic economy did nothing to help this problem, and deindustrialisation was the result from the 1990s (Booth et al., 2006).
From 2010 the wider middle class began suffering from the same shortages as businesses: having built a house in, say, Area 47 of Lilongwe, they are unable to keep it lighted, to have fuel enough to get to work, or sufficient forex to send their kids abroad to university. In the rural areas the slow delivery of subsidies – due to forex and transport problems – made it hard to plant in time for the rains. The bulk of the poor were hurt too, by lack of medicines and higher food prices – caused by the rise of the parallel market in forex and from the zero-deficit budget's new taxes – and by erratic public services. Taken together the population had become restive and the political settlement reached in 2009 was breaking down. If facing an election in March 2012, Mutharika and the DPP would undoubtedly have lost, assuming of course that the opposition was able to field a credible candidate and present sensible policy prescriptions.
July 2011 demonstrations and demands
The crisis was sparked in mid February 2011 when Inspector General of Police Mukhito called a public policy lecturer at Chancellor College to his office after he had taught a class on civil rights and used a Tunisian example. Accused of inciting students to demonstrate against the government, he returned to Zomba and requested and was granted a leave of absence by the university authorities. After that his co-workers ‘boycotted’ their ‘unsafe’ classrooms, demanding a guarantee of academic freedom from government interference. Typically, Mutharika accused the political scientist of ‘teaching revolution’, equivocated about the meaning of academic freedom, and ordered the ‘striking’ professors back to work. (The minister of education, the president's brother Peter Mutharika, was mute.) Thereafter there was a string of injunctions and multiple court cases, the dismissal of the four lecturers/leaders of the Academic Staff Union and a number of demonstrations by staff and students in which the police used live bullets and teargas resulting in no classes being held for ten months.
Meanwhile Mutharika had suspended the Electoral Commission for four months (December 2010 to April 2011) while the ministry of finance investigated fraud. This enabled him to further delay local council elections, overdue since 2005. When the commission was reinstated he announced there would be no local elections until 2014, which further antagonised opposition politicians and human rights campaigners. They were also incensed by new laws passed by the DPP-dominated assembly, which advanced censorship and government powers. These included an amendment to Penal Code Section 46, which gives the minister of information the right to ban media in the public interest; a change to the Police Act that permits the police to search properties without a warrant; new legislation (the Civil Procedures Act) that gives government three days to respond to an injunction filed against it; a new Local Courts Act that raised fears of a return of Banda's repressive ‘traditional courts’; and legislation that changed the national flag with little public consultation.
Little success was made when non-governmental organization (NGO) leaders met the president in late February 2011 to discuss economic issues, the Chancellor College impasse and civil rights. They then tried to organise a set of public events but were refused permission by city authorities and the police. Meanwhile DPP rallies were being held to promote the president's brother, Peter Mutharika, as a 2014 presidential candidate. Meant to discourage their organising, from February 2011 death threats and attacks on several key NGO leaders sent many into hiding. The president's speech at a DPP rally in early March appeared to condone such harassment: his predecessors Banda and Muluzi, Mutharika said, ‘were not going in the streets to fight those who insulted them, but it was the[ir] ruling parties which were to instil discipline. I want DPP members to ensure discipline in Malawi. I leave it in your hands’ (Maravi Post 2011).
After eight foreign heads of mission published a statement saying they shared the concerns of Malawians about governance trends, and WikiLeaks spread donor views of national politics, the president and cabinet members called in representatives to warn them not to interfere in domestic politics. In a speech, Mutharika accused donors of breaching the Vienna Convention by supporting NGOs. Matters came to a head in April after an email from the British high commissioner to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office was leaked and published. It described the deteriorating governance situation, the condition of donor–government relationships and the threats to NGO leaders, and opined that Mutharika ‘is becoming ever more autocratic and intolerant of criticism’ – a phrase that must have galled because it echoed a critical COMESA report on Mutharika's behaviour that got him fired as its secretary-general more than a decade earlier. It concluded that government ‘is more paranoid’ due to the Arab Spring's emboldening of civil society activists. Within weeks the high commissioner was deported (Heads of Mission 2011; Malawi Democrat 2011a, 2011b; Nyasa Times 2011a; COMESA 1997).
Britain responded by reviewing the full range of issues in the bilateral relationship. The withdrawal of donor funds (contributing 13.4% of GDP in 2008), which had already started, escalated. By mid year no general budget support had been pledged for 2011–12. This seemed to suit the Malawian government's new aid policy,5 which was made public in the finance minister's ‘zero-deficit budget’ speech (Government of Malawi 2011). Increased taxation and duties were expected to cover recurrent expenditure, he said, and any donor aid would go into the development budget. Prices, already rising in response to scarcity, began to climb further as new taxes took hold. Poorer peri-urban residents were particularly hit by increases in transport, paraffin, and basic-commodity prices.
NGOs planned and received permission to hold peaceful demonstrations about civil rights, donor relations and the domestic economy in the main cities on 20 July. In the days before, DPP pickup trucks loaded with youths carrying pangas, which were apparently meant to intimidate potential demonstrators, moved around Blantyre. On 20 July, people, many wearing red, tried to get into towns but found the police had set up roadblocks. When they arrived, they found to their fury that a judge had the night before banned the action in all but Blantyre, where the demonstration was allowed by police to proceed. In the end, marches were held in several towns and cities. A list of 20 demands for the president was handed to district commissioners by the organisers of the marches. The police beat several organisers in Lilongwe. Looters took advantage of the unrest and robbed and set alight stores, including a few shops run by Chinese, Burundians and Indians, while political activists destroyed DPP offices and those believed to belong to DPP financers (e.g. the Mulli brothers). When the crowds turned violent, the police shot protestors and arrested hundreds. All the while, the president was at State House in Lilongwe giving a ‘public lecture’ on history and politics that was broadcast nationwide on state radio. Twenty people died from wounds received in the riots, which took two days for the police and army to quell.
The 20 demands that activists handed to the district commissioners (DCs) were as follows (though this is not an exact transcription of the list, and additional comments are provided in parentheses):
- 1.
Ensure availability of, and access to, forex.
- 2.
Facilitate the importation of fuel without interruptions.
- 3.
Replace top management of ESCOM and Water Board with independent experts to reverse shortages within three months.
- 4.
The Anti-corruption Bureau (ACB) to investigate those implicated in the Malawi Housing Corporation (MHC) scandal. (Peter Mutharika and other senior officials and politicians allegedly jumped the queue and received houses at knock-down prices. In October 2011 the former manager of the MHC had been charged by the ACB, which said the politicians were innocent.)
- 5.
The ACB to investigate all cabinet ministers and public servants about unexplained wealth accumulated while holding office, and the Declaration of Assets Bill to be ‘ratified’.
- 6.
President Mutharika to declare his assets and explain the source of funds for building his new Ndata Farm house.
- 7.
Nullify Callista Mutharika's contract and require her to repay her salary. (She was appointed to a ‘volunteer’ job on maternal health and is paid a generous salary by government.)
- 8.
Law Commission to review Penal Code (the new Section 46 allows the minister of information to ban publications) and the new Injunctions Act (delaying for three days any action on injunctions filed against government; Mutharika had signed the act into law even though there was an injunction filed against it) and to make recommendations on their constitutionality within six months.
- 9.
Mutharika to act in good faith toward Vice-President Joyce Banda. (She was expelled from the DPP, had her motorcade withdrawn, and had been barred from official duties as she was seen as a political threat to the DPP's 2014 presidential candidate, Peter Mutharika. She started her own political party thereafter. The president filed a constitutional case to see if he could remove her from office, and in October there were rumours that she would be arrested for sedition.)
- 10.
Government should hold local council elections within the next year.
- 11.
The University Council should readmit the four dismissed lecturers and affirm that no spies will be allowed in lecture rooms.
- 12.
Nullify the president's order for NGOs to pay MWK2 million prior to any demonstration. (This decree was challenged in court.)
- 13.
Halt the inequitable and politicised use of public broadcasters (MBC and TV Malawi). (This is a complaint going back to the pre-transitional period.)
- 14.
The executive to stop disregarding court rulings and contempt of court charges.
- 15.
Provide essential drugs to all hospitals and clinics. (This and following demands reflect the presence of health-sector activists among the demonstration's leadership. Other sectors had similar complaints but were not directly represented.)
- 16.
Provide capacity building for health workers.
- 17.
Pay overdue allowances (up to three years are overdue) to nurses.
- 18.
Raise the national minimum wage to MWK25,000/month.
- 19.
Ensure ‘decent jobs and conditions for all workers’.
- 20.
Institute a social protection system for the welfare of the poorest.
After the disturbances, while the president made threats to ‘smoke out’ and arrest the organisers, and the donors called for dialogue, civil society planned a second mass demonstration – a 48-hour vigil to be held in four cities on 17–18 August. Mutharika, unhappy with the army's slow reaction in July, appointed a new, relatively junior officer to take command, giving rise to rumours of army unrest, the arrival of Zimbabwean mercenaries camped outside Lilongwe, and the possible ‘fall’ of Mutharika's government. The government announced the appointment of a commission of enquiry to investigate the events of 20–21 July, which began its work at the end of the year. Meanwhile the fuel crisis worsened, the university boycott continued, much-needed aid for infrastructure was halted, and first lady Callista Mutharika angered civil society and proved out of touch with the life of commoners when she counselled rural women not to worry about national economic woes.6
As 17 August approached, the president toured markets and offered vendors ‘loans’ not to get involved in further demonstrations. He cajoled vigil organisers to come and talk to him, and tried to explain to audiences that some of the problems that sparked unrest were being addressed. In Addis Ababa the Malawian embassy released a statement at the end of July that presented a skewed version of events and highlighted economic grievances without noting civil rights concerns, blamed the World Bank and IMF for poor advice, and told half-truths about the causes of shortages. In the statement, government blamed the media, opposition parties and NGOs, saying they shared a ‘strong belief that governments are constituted for the sole purpose of implementing instructions from donors. This goes right against the project that Government has put in place to promote self awareness and self reliance that should sustain the concept of Malawi as a nation of achievers’ (Malawi Embassy 2011). This anti-Western-interventionist sentiment mirrors Mutharika's own writings (Mutharika 2010).
The planned mid August ‘vigil’ was cancelled, leading to a split among NGO leaders, more especially as some decided to negotiate with the government. Previously Mutharika had been contacted by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and shortly before 17 August his envoy arrived to talk with NGO and government representatives. A week later NGO leaders came together and compromised: dialogue with government under UN auspices would start, but a mid September vigil would also be planned. The UN resident representative warned that ‘hate speech’ could derail negotiations. Nonetheless, within a week Mutharika had gone out of his way to threaten activists. Speaking without notes at the Blantyre agricultural fair, he said:
Don't mistake the Government's silence for ineptitude. All those insolent people I can arrest them if I so wish. I want you to know that. Government remains in control but I choose to be silent because I believe in democracy. But there are some who, when drunk, go yak-yak-yak; don't think I can't arrest you. I want you to know that just because somebody outside (this country) says so I cannot arrest you. I can arrest you! Let this country go on fire if you want to. [But] what I want you to know. Ladies and gentlemen, I want to tell you enough is enough! I can't stomach this insolence anymore. (Nyasa Times 2011b)
The situation on the ground continued to deteriorate. Again, the 21 September vigil was called off by activists who were worried about further bloodshed and their NGOs being ‘deregistered’ by government. They proposed instead a three-day stay-away from work by sympathisers. The DPP claimed victory, as few people stayed home from work a second day. People grumbled that civil society leaders had let them down by postponing the vigil a second time, at the last minute. Rumours circulated that some leaders had been bought off.
The situation became increasingly murky soon after, when a student activist was found dead at the polytechnic in Blantyre. While the police claimed that the pathologist determined his death was suicide, the pathologist soon clarified that the youth had been beaten and he had not in fact fallen from the building as the police said. Soon it emerged that the boy had promised the police and DPP officials that his student organisation would help the government stop the August vigil, but when it had not been paid by the authorities as promised, he had threatened to make its involvement known. He also knew who was on the ‘hit list’ and threatened to publicise the names of the arsonists then at work. That he was murdered seemed all the more likely as it came amidst the series of arson attacks on activists' homes and offices and the arrest of the journalist breaking the story (Malawi Today 2011b). Meanwhile, threats against journalists and civil society campaigners continued, and an attempt to hold a vigil in front of parliament by the fledgling Forum for the Defence of Democracy later in October resulted in the organisers' arrest (Nyasa Times 2011c).
In late February 2012, human rights lawyer (and Mutharika's former attorney general) Ralph Kasambara was arrested for assault and detained by police in spite of the court ordering his release on bail. He was detained several days after he and his bodyguards captured and turned over to the police a group of young men reportedly attempting to firebomb Kasambara's office. It has been alleged they were sent by ruling-party officials because the rights activist had insisted earlier that week that the president could be impeached for ignoring parliamentary rulings concerning the payment of striking judicial staff (Nyasa Times 2012b; Face of Malawi 2012.)
Meanwhile the government sent delegations to the USA and Europe to get the aid tap – the IMF's ECF and donors' general budget support – turned back on. Earlier, in August 2011, it had agreed to a devaluation of 10%, making the kwacha MWK165 to the dollar. By the time they returned empty-handed the country was at a near standstill due to petrol and electricity shortages. Domestic tax receipts were significantly lower than the zero-deficit budget had anticipated and borrowing had climbed dramatically. Though the delegations announced that discussions had gone well and they expected aid to start flowing shortly, no donor echoed their claims. Negotiations between government and civil society continued and two concessions were made, which resulted in Chancellor College re-opening in November as the dispute over academic freedom was settled and no staff were fired as government had earlier insisted. Second, some of the controversial laws were sent back for review to government lawyers in December.
To meet civil society's 20 demands would be to develop Malawi. It wants improvements to the social safety net, the rule of law, national infrastructure, fiscal policies, election processes, human rights protection, human capacity, livelihoods, etc. None can be easily or quickly achieved, certainly not in a matter of months (e.g. water and electricity delivery). With political will, a few (e.g., local council elections, ACB investigations) could be initiated in relatively short order. But the demands were thrown together and not prioritised. Some (e.g. Ndata Farm and the first lady's salary) were much less likely to be addressed than others. So the list was impossible to tackle sensibly. Paring them down to seven key demands in September facilitated the concessions noted above, and donors intervened and imported an emergency supply of medicines in early 2012. But the other complaints were not rectified mostly because they were exacerbated by Malawi's development constraints,7 including its failure to upgrade its infrastructure, and because of its national political logic.
Malawi is a neopatrimonial state, though its post-independence regimes have differed in ways that are important to national development and governance (Cammack 2010, Cammack, Kelsall and Booth 2010). Two important trends for this discussion are the centralisation of power in the hands of president and the party-politicisation of economic policy and practice as well as the expression of public frustration. Driving decision making at the highest level since 2009 is what might be called ‘second-termism’, or succession politics. The logics underpinning these trends are rooted in Malawi's past and in its contemporary policymaking environment, and are unlikely to change in the short term.
Politics and protest
The jockeying for position in the political parties during Mutharika's second term is typically neopatrimonial: noted personalities forming their own parties, or trying to hive-off a section of an old party, with minions gathering around this ‘big man/woman’ with the hope of being carried into power in the 2014 election. Little in the way of issues separates these leaders, and all gather loyalists not by arguing policy but buying support and making promises. Recruitment and public loyalty are based on personalities, rarely platforms. In the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) we saw an attempt by younger politicians to oust the aged John Tembo, and to get the newcomer (ex-DPP) Henry Phoya to join (and perhaps lead) their movement. The United Democratic Front (UDF) was effectively split, with diehards sticking with Friday Jumbe, who still faces corruption charges, while others promoted the young lawyer Atupele Muluzi as a viable candidate in spite of his having no experience of government. (Were he anyone other than former President Bakili Muluzi's son he would not have a chance.) Vice-President Joyce Banda, eschewed by Mutharika from day one of his second term because he feared she had presidential ambitions, took the well-worn path of starting a new People's Party (PP) around herself. Her reliance on some old, discredited politicians undermined her viability with the elite, though the PP gained strength through her grassroots organising. In the northern region, divisions abounded as the Alliance for Democracy (AFORD) had nearly collapsed and no strong party had replaced it.
By March 2012 the DPP was running scared, not just of the masses who were angry about their declining living standards, but also of civil society leaders who were organising them, and of the political opposition. Added to the latter was a faction of the DPP MPs (called the Hope Alliance) who feared they could not win re-election if the president failed to change his policies and tactics. The ruling party's fear was evident in various ways, from its passage of rights-abusive legislation to attempts to muzzle the media and protests, and outright attacks on civic and political leaders. Mutharika's personal style was such that he vacillated from trying to reason with Malawians (e.g. to be patient), to criticising them (calling them ‘chickens’ for instance), and sometimes threatening them (‘burning out’ civil activists).
Mutharika indicated that even though he had sufficient DPP MPs to change the constitution to enable him to run for a third term – a claim that was not as straightforward as his party's numbers indicated – he would not try to extend his rule (Daily Times 2012b). Instead, he intended his brother Peter, an American-based law professor until Bingu became president, to lead the DPP as the presidential candidate in 2014. While constancy of development policy might be good for national economic development if the DPP won, there was little else to attract voters. They found the president's antagonising of donors and neighbouring states foolhardy. They were frustrated by the government's lack of progress on addressing the fundamental problems causing shortages of fuel and electricity especially. They were worried that the legislation passed in 2011 and various of Mutharika's speeches had the scent of autocracy about them. And few were enamoured by Peter Mutharika,8 who was seen to be ineffective as a minister.
In a vibrant democracy the legislature would be the site of debate about national economic difficulties and policies to address them. But Malawi's parliament is particularly weak. This is the result of deliberate changes in the political system since it was designed in 1993–94, changes that have increased the power of the executive. Key has been the appointment of cabinets whose members are drawn from the ranks of MPs, which increases the presidency's control of parliament. Unsuccessful attempts to have the leader of the opposition in parliament voted for by all MPs instead of just opposition party members were also meant to increase the president's power over the assembly and the opposition.
Since the transition and in spite of decentralisation, the presidency has gained power at the expense of local government – with the selection of local councillors along party lines rather than by technical merit, the cancellation since 2005 of local council elections, the restructuring of councils to include MPs as voting members, and the appointment of DCs and CEOs of cities/towns by the minister of local government and the office of the president and cabinet. The way local government is run now (without councils and with technocrats and ad hoc local committees appointed by DCs and CEOs) makes it directly answerable to central authority. Local government has also been undermined by an informal freeze on hiring of staff. Civil servants at national and local levels also report a narrowing of the ‘political space’ they have to design and implement technical solutions to national problems.
The presidency gained power in national government when the constitutional provision for a senate (upper chamber) was repealed in the 1990s and when constituents were denied the opportunity to recall MPs as originally stated in the constitution. The president's ability since the mid 1990s to appoint a second vice-president confers additional powers (for political manoeuvring) as well. The presidency has retained significant power through the appointment of boards, such as that which regulates the media, and the Electoral Commission. Presidents who head their own parties also control party funds, appointments to party offices, and even the selection of parliamentary candidates. Thus the presidency dominates parties, the assembly, and local and national government. It would like to control civil society, including the media, and the judiciary if it were feasible.
In this environment where the DPP dominates parliament and where MPs are dominated by the president, there is little open debate in parliament about government policies and abuses. Opposition parties are in disarray. Thus the national assembly has been unable to play its role as a ‘platform for national dialogue’, which was also the case in Mutharika's first term (Chinsinga 2010, p. 127). For this reason civil society activists stepped into the breach in 2011, even though few are development specialists and had little idea when they started how to fix the economy. Theirs is a governance and human rights mission, which in Malawi is easily confused with politics.
Agreeing to negotiations in August 2011 split civil society leadership, and until Mutharika's death efforts had been underway by government and party activists to curtail the activities of its more radical wing. Individual campaigners had been approached by ruling-party-cum-government officials with offers of jobs in embassies and university scholarships, while others were picked up by police on spurious charges and questioned. The arson campaign against civic leaders' offices and homes, and telephone threats against activists and their families had an impact. So, too, had the murder of the polytechnic student who had agreed to help the authorities and then reneged and threatened to tell all. These carrots and sticks used by DPP stalwarts, along with government's refusals to allow public demonstrations, dampened organised dissent.
Until 5 April, the situation in the country remained tense, with sporadic fighting breaking out in unlikely places. For instance, in January vendors – who as a group are suffering as the economy collapses – started stripping women in Lilongwe's old town of miniskirts and trousers, in what was presumed to be an atavistic attempt to impose Dr Banda's old dress code. More likely though, it was an effort to recreate the violent atmosphere of a fortnight earlier when running battles between the police and vendors (about whether vendors might move out of markets and sell on the pavements) led to looting of shops and theft from passers-by.9 More understandable were fights breaking out at petrol stations as drivers tried to cut into days-long fuel queues and as motorists sought to halt jerry-can-toting young men from buying the limited supply of fuel (for black marketing – at more than double the pump price – as well as for legitimate uses like running generators). College students became violent at a bank that refused to provide them funds because it had not received their long-overdue grants from government. Judiciary employees went on strike for similar reasons. Adding to tension were the delayed and uneven rainy season, which Malawians depend on for their staple maize, and reports of maize shortages as prices began to climb. Finally, activists suggest that little progress was being made by the negotiating teams towards solving the deeply rooted and highly sensitive problems raised in the protestors' 20 demands. As a result, civic leaders set a deadline of March 2012 to see real progress or they would halt negotiations and take to the streets again.
Looking forward
In the short term, getting the country back on track with the IMF would make it easier for other donors to resume their general budget support. But for unknown reasons Mutharika was adamant that he would not revise the exchange rate (he claimed this is because he wanted to protect poor Malawians, which donors say they want to do too.) Until the forex rate is changed it seemed likely that government would have to continue to borrow to cover its wage bill, that new infrastructural activities would be minimal, and that forex shortages and price rises world continue, even as government resorted to borrowing to buy fuel.
Long-term solutions to Malawi's severe economic problems require major investment in infrastructure – e.g. an additional water pipeline for Blantyre city, overhaul of the rail line countrywide, multiple irrigation schemes, additional electricity generators and distribution systems, liquid sanitation pipelines, upgraded urban and main roads and additional rural roads, cheaper cellular telephone and internet structures, etc. Problems inhibiting foreign investment, including weak governance and rule-of-law systems, need addressing. Tobacco growing and selling may respond to the rules of supply and demand, and rebound.10 Meanwhile, efforts to promote diversification are intermittent and slow. In many sectors good policies are written, but strategic planning, funding, staffing and implementation are inadequate. The legal and institutional frameworks underpinning reform measures are often weak too, such as the national land law and urban-planning practices. The historical constraints to growth continue to determine the nation's future even though new enterprises (e.g. minerals) are emerging. A transformative economic vision with strategic planning and implementation are required of government to create the environment needed for business and investors to flourish.
In 2009 it was thought that perhaps Mutharika might offer such a vision and that as a ‘developmental neopatrimonial’ leader he might be capable of implementing it (Cammack, Kelsall, and Booth 2010). This hope died though, as Malawi's deeply rooted political logic undermined it. Attempts to ensure that the DPP governs after 2014, and more especially that Peter Mutharika is president, drove policymaking at the top. Rather than working with his vice-president, Mutharika sidelined her and generated national ill will. Rather than listening to dissenting voices, he surrounded himself with ‘hand-clappers’ (sycophants) intent on telling him what he wanted to hear. Rather than take advice from technocrats, he relied on politicians to establish economic policies. Rather than fighting corruption, senior politicians and the DPP benefited from it.
The politicisation of key appointments, of negotiations with critics, of spontaneous public unrest, of public service delivery, etc. was commonplace. No complaint could be raised by church leaders, civic activists, donors or analysts without their being accused – by Mutharika or his smooth spokesman, Dr Ntaba, or his vociferous minister of information, Ms Kaliati – of fronting for Joyce Banda and her People's Party. Key positions in government, such as the National Intelligence Bureau chief, were going to party officials rather than technically skilled people. It was expected that appointments to the new Malawi Electoral Commission would be run through the party-political sieve.
Such practices, along with the tendency of government to politically manipulate chiefs to support the president's decisions (e.g., to make Peter Mutharika his successor) and to favour people from the southern region, especially from the president's Lomwe tribe, when filling vacancies, generated criticism by activists, northerners, the media, analysts, and the urban elite. Those trends, in combination with those abuses that gave rise to some of civil society's 20 demands, brought to mind Dr Hastings Kamuzu Banda's thirty years of single-party, autocratic rule, which above all else Malawians do not want to revisit. Mutharika's inability to communicate with his people, to appear conciliatory, caring and understanding of their concerns, frustrated Malawians further.
Fixing the nation's economic problems was probably easier than addressing civil society's demands concerned with governance and rule of law and rights abuses. For instance, getting the Anti-corruption Bureau to investigate a sitting president and ministers was practically impossible, as was ensuring the president explained how he became a rich man on a civil servant's salary, with Ndata Farm to show for it, within the space of a dozen years.
Some civic activists were campaigning for a referendum to get Mutharika to resign in 2012 and to call fresh elections, a move that was unlikely unless huge numbers of DPP MPs defected. (Any attempt by government to halt MPs ‘crossing the floor’ of parliament is important to watch.) Some people's confusion about the nature of Malawi's political system – a set, five-year term for an executive president rather than a parliamentary democracy with a prime minister – complicated discussions about the early removal of Mutharika. Attempts by some opposition politicians to hijack civil society's movement – and their reported offer in July 2011 of being ‘ready to take over’ – made matters worse. The closeness of some civic leaders to opposition parties also compromised the movement, and made it easier for government to accuse all critics of being partisan.
There was also an attempt to get Mutharika declared mentally unfit to govern, which was being pressed by Joyce Banda's People's Party (Nyasa Times 2012a). This effort chimed well with young people's frustration with Malawi's gerontocracy. Many of Malawi's youth call for setting aside the older generation of leaders (like the Mutharika brothers, John Tembo, Gwanda Chakuamba) and replacing them with new young blood. There is some truth to the fact that these older men and women learned to do politics during the Banda regime. But to think that things will change only because they are not in power is naïve. The institutions and incentives that drive politics in Malawi are rooted in the nature of big-man political parties, in clientelist relations that provide benefits in return for loyalty, in the lack of alternatives in the small private sector for making big money (as may be earned by being in government), and in the logic that centralises control in the hands of the executive. To change these requires a shift in Malawi's fundamental political economy.
No one was seriously discussing the forceful removal of government though often Mutharika and associates spoke as though revolution was a real threat. People were often picked up and threatened with arrest for treason for expressing alternative views, but in fact, Malawians' passivity generally, especially in the face of the police, paramilitaries and the army (let alone a contingent of Mugabe's army on loan) is understood to be deeply engrained. The death of 20 people in mid July and police actions since, are a lesson all have taken to heart.
The unexpected happens
In the morning of 5 April 2012 Dr Mutharika had a heart attack and died. His close associates hid his demise, shuffled his body off to South Africa and said he was ill. Several tried to get the judiciary to declare Vice-President Joyce Banda ineligible for the presidency – because she belonged to a different political party – and hoped instead to put Peter Mutharika into power. Meanwhile Mrs Banda quietly worked to gain the support of donors, the army, neighbouring governments, and civil society. Only after Pretoria confirmed Mutharika's death was she sworn in.
Her first moves were to appoint a new Inspector General of police and a new head of the state media, and to invite tobacco companies' managements back to the country. Within days she gained control of the Reserve Bank and had begun negotiations with the IMF. After Mutharika's burial, she appointed an ‘inclusive’ cabinet of opposition party leaders, old UDF politicians, MPs from the DPP's Hope Alliance, and some representing outlying districts. Her State of the Nation address in early May indicated that she would continue with many of Mutharika's economic policies, but would float the kwacha, repeal his rights-abusive legislation, invite the British back, and appoint commissions to enquire into the death of the university activist in 2011 and into the events surrounding Mutharika's death and removal to South Africa. She began to tackle what she calls the economic ‘mess’ she inherited by getting fuel (from South Africa and Zambia), talking to the Mozambicans about Cahora Bassa electricity, and clamping down on corruption. A big challenge will be keeping her government inclusive as the 2014 elections approach.
Note on contributors
Diana Cammack is an historian who has written about southern African politics and development for three decades. She is a Research Associate of the Overseas Development Institute, and for the last five years has led the Local Governance and Leadership stream of the Africa Power and Politics Programme. She has lived and worked in Malawi for a dozen years.